


Vengeance

by blazingsnark



Category: Elsword (Video Game)
Genre: F/M, based off of CrA's PvP lose pose where the Shade drags her up and disappears
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-03
Updated: 2015-10-03
Packaged: 2018-04-24 15:07:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,369
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4924276
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blazingsnark/pseuds/blazingsnark
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Add loves Elesis, but he's helpless when the demons she's battling are part of her.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Vengeance

Elesis' chest heaved as she ran, heeled boots digging into the blood-soaked earth. Add, always fastidiously neat about his person, glided a few inches above the disgusting battlefield.

“You know, they're all dead,” he said conversationally, Dynamo jolting suddenly as they lifted him over a demon's cut up corpse. He was used to the sudden movements of his tools, though, and kept his balance.

“They're not all dead. Not yet,” Elesis growled, and Add sighed.

“Yes, they are, kukuku. You've demolished everything.” He reached into his storage dimension, drawing out a red potion in a triangular bottle and handing it to Elesis. She unstoppered and drank it without halting her stride.

“There's more, there's always more, more killing and more destruction and they _killed people_ and I have to avenge-”

Add pushed his heels down, his Dynamo responding instantly and slowing to a hovering stop. If the Shade was influencing Elesis this much right now, there was no option but for her to run herself ragged and collapse. It would fall to Add to care for her, and he still didn't know how she had survived before the two of them met.

Elesis noticed that he wasn't at her side anymore. She spun on one heel, gold eyes glowing with dark light. “Are you abandoning me too, now?”

Add simply looked at her for a few seconds. “No,” he said eventually. “Those demons back there seemed to have technology that I want to examine, kukuku. If you want to come...?”

For a moment, the light in Elesis' eyes seemed to waver, the gold deepening to a reddish hue, and Add allowed himself a bit of hope that she could break away from the Shade. Those hopes were dashed in a moment as the red faded, the dark light returning.

Elesis made an uncertain movement toward Add with her claymore, then spun and dashed away, the point of her sword dragging in the bloody mud.

Add watched her go, then suddenly held out his hand. “Time Sigil,” he muttered, and the familiar milky bubble soared out to envelop Elesis and create the Seal of Time. Hopefully, between that and her Shade keeping her 'alive', today wouldn't be the day that the former Red-Haired Knight fell.

 

The demon technology didn't exist, by the way. Add had just used it as an excuse not to get drawn into another battle by Elesis' side. The only thing that had convinced him to come had been the promise of testing his new time equation. Drawing matter from other dimensions was possible now, he discovered, but the changes were good for little else. In the back of his mind, he was already turning over the long string of numbers and variables and wondering what other changes he could make to it in order to achieve his desired result.

He abruptly leaned to one side and started circling upwards in the air, forcing his Dynamo to strive ever higher above the horror of the silent battlefield. One of them vibrated and flashed a warning screen. Add disabled it with a motion and continued rising. He didn't know what the warning had been about, and he didn't care.

Finally, he was high enough to see Elesis fighting her way through a small cluster of demons. Well, the cluster had originally been very large, judging by the dead bodies piled around Elesis. They were guarding a labyrinth of crumbling stone ruins.

Add watched the small red figure work her way toward the walls from his lofty perch for a minute or two, then opened a portal beneath himself and dropped into the dimension.

Immediately, everything blurred and became indistinct. Add could still vaguely sense the shapes of everything that had been around him, but it was merely black mist that vanished if he tried to look directly at it. A soft purple light came from somewhere, filtering through the swirling, monochrome mists of time. Once in a while, a random purple cube would float by, occasionally shattering into thousands more of tiny cubes that floated in their own directions.

Add glided through the dimension, feeling something like water lapping at his exposed skin even though there was nothing like that in sight. Not for the first time, he was glad for the protection of his bodysuit and Dynamo shields. There was no floor, no ceiling, no walls in this dimension, and he had no idea how far it went. However long he spent in the dimension, though, no more than five seconds elapsed for the outside world.

He paused, checking his coordinates, then shook his head and used his weight to cue the Dynamo forward. If he was to open a window to watch over Elesis, he needed to be at her exact location – ah, here it was.

“Dynamo, thin the veil,” he commanded, and the Dynamo stopped pushing him forward to fly up and describe an arcane gesture in the air with crackling arcs of electricity. The dimension shimmered, and suddenly there was a clear window right in front of Add, letting him see into the real world and hear what transpired. It was a position above Elesis' head and slightly to the side, allowing him a clear view of her face as well as an idea of the general movements of her personal massacre. He commanded his Dynamo to hold the window open, tucking his knees to his chest and floating in the void to watch.

A wreath of silver mist undulated past the window. Add impatiently waved it away and watched Elesis defeat the cluster and run forward into the ruins, navigating the empty and crumbling “halls” until she happened upon a rather large area in the middle. Add's window moved with her.

Then Add heard footsteps, so loud and heavy that he could have sworn the alternate dimension shook. Add looked to the side, as far as the window would allow, and snorted in surprise when he saw a gigantic blue demon stomping toward Elesis. With a horned head, a cape, and a massive and jagged sword in one meaty hand, Add wondered how the Crimson Avenger would react to this obviously high-ranking demon.

He could pinpoint the moment that Elesis caught sight of it. Her shoulders tensed, her death grip on the hilt of her claymore tightening even more.

“You!”

“Knight,” the demon rumbled, then laughed. “You failed against me twice. What makes you think this'll be any different?”

Elesis didn't seem to comprehend what he was saying for a moment. Then, suddenly, she did.

“That was you that planned the attack! You're responsible for... for... everything!”

The demon laughed again, louder, and only stopped when Elesis charged and drove her claymore into his leg.

“Blood Cutter!”

Add's eyes widened as Elesis was summarily thrown back with a single swipe of the blue sword. He knew the Shade would help its vessel survive – and yes, up she got – but that  _had_ to have taken a toll.

Their battle was brief. Elesis wounded the blue demon severely, but that seemed only to enrage it. It only took a few minutes for Elesis to miss a strike, and the demon pounced on his opportunity. The sword swept down, an arc of blue energy causing Elesis to fly back, hit the wall hard enough to crack a few ribs (if she was lucky, Add thought in faintly morbid amusement), and crumple to the ground.

The demon stalked toward her. Add didn't see any signs of her getting up, and the Seal of Time was long worn off. He couldn't,  _wouldn't_ , stand by as another person he cared about died. He didn't mind Elesis putting herself in danger – he knew she could take care of herself – but death was another matter entirely.

Add stood with the help of his Dynamo, turning the window into a portal. His eyes burned black with protective rage as the demon raised his sword to disintegrate the small red figure crumpled at his feet.

“No miracle's gonna drop outta the sky and save you now,” the demon rumbled, then grunted in animal pleasure as the sword started to descend.....

Only to find the sword lost to him as a portal opened above Elesis, sucking the sword in and then closing. Add dropped from the alternate dimension (he'd have to find that sword later; it could mess up his calculations for traveling back in time) and immediately activated his Nasod Armor.

The demon regarded him only for a moment before Add jumped upwards, punching three electrical bullets at the demon with the help of his Dynamo to activate the electrical armor. Then he dove for the ground and slammed it with a punch, driving the demon back and stunning him as he executed a series of complicated swirling kicks and finished it off by opening multiple cracks in space and time that drained life from the demon. He laughed. The demon's eyes were so startled, the noises he made as his life was drained from him were so futile, that it gave Add a nicely overwhelming sense of power.

Finally, he got bored and kicked the demon away. Now it was the demon's turn to soar backwards, but his superior weight and size had him crashing through half the stone walls of the labyrinth before he landed outside it, skidding a couple of feet before lying unmoving on the ground.

Add didn't check to make sure it was dead, mainly out of pressing concern for Elesis and disdain for the demon. He turned and raced back to his girlfriend, dropping to a kneeling position on his Dynamo to check if she was breathing.

She was. Faintly, but she was. Add reached for a healing potion, then started back in surprise as she took a deep, rattling breath. Her eyes opened wide, pupils dilated, gaze casting around but not seeming to register anything. Her back arched and her hands flew up, clutching at her chest as a darkness boiled around her.

Add was forced back to a standing position as the Shade separated itself from Elesis, hovering above its host's body for a second before extending a clawed hand and motioning upward.

Elesis was dragged up by her chest like a rag doll, hanging suspended. Her arms dropped limply from her chest, hands fisted as they dangled.

“Elesis?!” Add asked concernedly, taking a step toward her, but he was rebuffed by a shield of invisible power around the girl and the Shade.

“Worthless,” the personified shadow spat, and Elesis lifted her head to stare at it dully. The old Elesis would never have tolerated that insult, Add knew.

“Stupid, weak little bitch,” the Shade continued. Its voice was like a harsher version of Elesis' own, one that grated on Add's ears. Even through that, it still managed to be Elesis' voice. “That was your chance at decisive revenge, slut, but you didn't take it. I taught you to transcend the limits of your pitiful human body, but still you stopped when it started breaking. _Pathetic._ ”

The Shade curled its fingers. Elesis made a strangled gasping noise, her hands shooting up to grab at her chest again, fingers scrabbling for purchase. The Shade probably would have been smiling if it had a mouth. And all Add could do was watch, frozen in terrified horror.

“You have to be _saved_ from a _weakling_ of a race you vowed to _eradicate_? Does your vengeance mean nothing?” the Shade taunted as Elesis kept clawing at her own skin like she was trying to rip her heart out. “Worthless, weak little girl. You know the price of failure.”

“Please...” Elesis gasped out, and Add's knees gave out at the word. Brave, strong Elesis, the one who had willingly taken the Dark El to survive, who put her life in danger to destroy those who did wrong, was begging. There was a note of terror and despair in her voice. “Please don't...”

“Please _don't_?” the Shade snarled. Its fingers curled more, and Elesis' mouth opened in a silent scream. “You should be thankful, you worthless human scum. Thankful that I keep you alive, thankful that I don't kill you for your weakness.”

For a moment, Elesis' old defiant glare was back, then the Shade clenched its fist and the fight went out of Elesis. Her back arched, chest forced up, and a strangled scream wrenched from her throat.

“Th-thank y-you,” she managed to choke out, and the Shade's hand unclenched, allowing Elesis' body to relax a bit, though she was still suspended in the air. The defeat and despair in Elesis' voice was even stronger now.

“I'm worthless, I'm a failure, I failed you and myself. I'm a pathetic, selfish weakling.”

Add wanted to cover his ears as Elesis verbally dehumanized herself, but he couldn't move. This was bringing back memories of his own days as a slave. But no, this was worse, because Elesis had no hope and no chance of escape.

Finally, the Shade raised its hand higher. Elesis floated higher in the air to correspond to it.

“This is the price of failure, which you already know,” the Shade hissed, then dropped Elesis brutally.

The girl's human body crashed into the stone ground. Something snapped audibly. Her eyes widened in shock and pain, then the Shade dove back into its host headfirst.

Elesis' back arched, her hands splaying against the ground, and her mouth opened to emit a tortured scream. Add scrambled forward, relieved that the invisible barrier wasn't in the way anymore, and reached out for her.

She thrashed around, not allowing Add any closer to her. All the time, that hoarse scream was carrying on the air, giving voice to the agony the Shade was clearly wreaking on her mind and body. Her eyes were screwed tight, tears leaking from them as she convulsed, the only break from her cries being short, ragged breaths which seemed only to serve the purpose of fueling the sound once more.

Finally, Add had to admit defeat, kneeling beside Elesis helplessly, feeling tears run down his cheek and desperately praying to whatever deities hadn't abandoned him as he was forced to watch the torture of the girl he loved.


End file.
